I recently read a book that I've never seen mentioned by API, but that I think probably falls in line with its principles. It's called The Mother-Daughter Project and is written by SuEllen Hamkins and Renee Schultz. They have a web site: www.themother-daughterproject.com.

The book is really geared towards older kids - which might be nice since so much of what we do is geared toward younger kids. And even those of us who don't have older kids yet will one day!

I'm curious to know if anyone else has read it and what they thought. I loved the ideas in it for connecting with your growing daughters.

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My favorites are Connection Parenting, The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding (LLL), and The Baby book (Dr. Sears). Right now I'm reading ScreamFree Parenting by Hal E. Runkel. It's really easy to read and has a lot of good guy stuff in it like superheros and Judo! Great for Dads and I'm breezing through it.

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A group member of ours found a great book at a garage sale and donated it to our library, one I had never heard of or seen mentioned in AP circles: Your Competent Child by Jesper Juul. I can't say enough great things about it! Very AP and such a great read.

A group member of ours found a great book at a garage sale and donated it to our library, one I had never heard of or seen mentioned in AP circles: Your Competent Child by Jesper Juul. I can't say enough great things about it! Very AP and such a great read.

Thank you as well. I've put it on the list. Can you find out from your group member what she really liked about the book? I love to have these snippets of what people liked about the books.

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The full title for the book is Your Competent Child: Toward New Basic Values for the Family. It is written by a Danish family therapist who has been in practice for over 30 years. It's not a book that has a lot of specifics on how you should parent, but is more of a "big picture" type. It's overall message is treating each other with equal dignity. He gets into the psychology (but not too much so) behind more traditional parenting practices and the benefits we see from treating children with kindness and respect from the moment of birth. He has sections on creating over-responsible children (which really spoke to me because it described my childhood), teenage rebellion, the conflict between integrity and cooperation, self esteem vs. self confidence, and so much more.

I think his main goal in writing the book is helping parents who aren't comfortable with the traditional hierarchy in families move to new kinds of relationships based on honesty, integrity, and respect. Very thought-provoking.